


Forget about the palms

by TerresDeBrume



Series: AUs without a cause [12]
Category: Marvel Avengers Movies RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Wingfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-05
Updated: 2013-02-05
Packaged: 2017-11-28 07:40:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/671948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TerresDeBrume/pseuds/TerresDeBrume
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>And they wait and wait and wait for Tom’s limo, but the thing is, he’s not driving to the festival this time.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>A sequel of sorts to <i><a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/512642">Fly your feelings away</a></i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Forget about the palms

**Author's Note:**

> Another one of my long-overdue crossposting. I should be caught up soon enough tho, so you won't have to bear with them for very long ;)

She comes to him on a Sunday night, late enough that the street lights have been turned out and the village is plunged in darkness.

 

It’s a plain town of about three hundred inhabitants, if you stretch to the dogs –the farm down by the highway has fourteen of them, but Tom’s not sure they really count as part of the village. There’s nothing picturesque about it, it’s just one of those French villages of modern times with old mortared stones and smooth cement walls, geraniums at the windows, farm smells and streets unlit between two and six in the morning. Not that there’s much to cast light on past eleven, save maybe the neighborhood cats, loose dogs and squirrels.

Still, that’s where he decided to go, maybe especially  _because_  there’s nothing really interesting here –there’s a mill, not too far off, where they make artificial flowers, apparently the last in Europe, but it’s not so popular an attraction that tourists come to lodge all the way here. People around the village don’t really mind him. They call him  _le rosbif_  –it took him a while to understand that it’s a bastardization of _roast beef_ \- and they smile at him but not to him –although he’s had his fair share of neighbors being curious and asking questions with exaggeratedly slow words and a lot of gesturing, especially the old people –the younger ones are better at English, but many of them just don’t care about it.

He doesn’t mind too much. He came here to be left alone, after all, and he knows -hopes- he’s not famous enough that people are sure to have seen him in magazines or TV programs yet.

 

 

Usually, night is when he goes flying.

He hasn’t seen anybody with wings here, and the rare time he catches the word – _ailes_ , they say in French. It sounds a bit like  _ale_ , what with the mute ‘s’- it’s mostly said on the offhandedly-disgusted tone you keep for things you pretend not to mind but still find weird. The same kind of tone people reserve for sentences like  _I’m not a homophobe, but…_  He never tried to understand the exact words, and keeps to himself, wings carefully hidden at all times.

It’s not new to him, hiding them. It’s the first thing he’s learned to do, until he was twelve and snuck out on the roof to take off for the first time. He remembers the elation of flying, the wind in his hair, the cold on his shoulders, and then the pain of his broken wrist when he was sharply reminded that he also needed to learn how to land.

Tonight though, he decided to stay in –winged people are far less sensitive to the cold, and he’s found an online shop that delivers specifically designed clothes, so he  _could_  go there, but he doesn’t really feel like it.

 

He’s just finished his tea and changed into his pajama bottoms when he hears someone knock at the door.

Now, in London or any big city, he’d probably call the police right away, but this village is close to nowhere, the kind of town you have to live in a radius of five miles to know. So he goes to the window next to the door, making sure to fold his wings back in –it’s as uncomfortable as ever, having them hidden inside, like a low-level burn tearing at his shoulder blades, and the more he keeps his wings out, the more disagreeable it gets to hide them- before he peeks at his visitor.

He sees the petite silhouette, the slight built and the soft hair before he recognizes her nose –why her nose especially, he doesn’t know- and opens the door for her.

 

“Natalie,” he asks, “what are you doing here?”

 

She doesn’t answer him and walks forward, peeking at the rooms as she passes them –a corridor to the bedroom, bathroom, water closet on the left, then kitchen in front and dining room on the right. This is where she goes, ignoring the television room on her left to stand next to the large wooden table Tom hasn’t taken time to replace. He wants to ask what she’s doing again, but by then she’s already stripped to her bra, and she yelps when her right wing hits the grandmother wardrobe behind her.

Now that he can look at her, Tom sees the dark circles under her eyes, the mussed state of her hair, the paleness of her skin that can only be due to her lack of sleep. Her wings are chestnut brown, like her hair, each longer than she’s tall, with ruffled feathers and jerky movements Tom recognizes from when he keeps his hidden for too long. They’re moving on and about, as if disconnected from Natalie’s body, and Tom scowls.

 

“When was the last time you took them out?”

“Ten.”

“Ten years ago?” He asks, disbelieving, and tears finally spill over Natalie’s eyelids as she shakes her head.

“No. When I was ten.”

 

He thought horrifies him.

Even at the height of his phobia, even back when he hated his wings as much as he loved the ability to fly, Tom has never been able to keep them away for more than a couple of days. He’s always had this urge to take his wings out, even before clipping was outlawed, and he can’t quite imagine what it must have felt like for Natalie to keep such an important part of herself hidden for so long. He takes her in his arm as she cries, wings still agitated with spasm that look like electric shock, and rests his chin on her head, petting her hair and folding his own wings around them.

 

“First rule of the house,” he says a while later, when her tears have quieted a bit, “Wings out. All the time.”

“I don’t know what to do with them,” she confesses.

“I’ll show you,” he promises. “Don’t worry it’ll be fine. Moving with them is weird at first, and if you want to act with them out, there’s a bit more training to get down, but it’ll all be worth it when you’ll fly for the first time.”

“When?” She asks, more hopeful now.

“I don’t know,” Tom has to admit. “But I promise it  _will_  happen.”

 

That night, for the first time in her life, Natalie sleeps with her wings draped around her like a tent.

 

**{ooo}**

 

“Quoi?”

“Uh… Tom?” Chris Hemsworth says, “Are you all right?”

“Sleepy. It’s four in the morning here, Chris.”

“Oh! Oh, sorry it’s… I’m in New Mexico and it’s only nine here so… ah. I can call back later if you want?”

“No, no, go ahead,” Tom yawns. “I’m up now anyway, I’ll just grab a nap this afternoon or something.”

 

Natalie, who is busy stretching her wings on the other side of the dining room, tilts her head at him and he mouths ‘Hemsworth’. She smiles, indulgent, and Tom puts his back to her, careful to keep his wings close to his body.

 

“I was wondering if you’d be up for an outing in a couple of weeks?” Chris says, and Tom picks at a bit of dust that’s clinging to his left wing.

“I’d have said yes but I’m not… I won’t be free by then.” Behind him, he can hear Natalie’s breathing become more labored, more erratic as she makes her muscles open and close her wings as far and quick as she dares while inside –it’s been two months and today, they start gliding.

“Oh. Can I ask why?”

“I’m helping a friend with a problem of hers,” Tom says. “It’s a bit delicate and I’d rather not stop now that we’re so close to the end.”

“Okay,” Chris say, and Tom hears the disappointment in his voice, wishes with all his heart he could say yes, wishes Chris had asked him out on a date instead of a simple outing because God knows he’d have said yes in a heartbeat then, with or without Natalie there. “Another time, then.”

“Yes,” Tom agrees, “Another time.”

 

He hangs up with a heavy heart, but knowing he’s taken the right decision. He can’t keep running to Chris every time he calls. Not that the younger man is taking advantage of it or anything, it’s just… Tom needs to get a grip. He needs to realize and accept that there’s no hope there and get over it, or at least try to. Because if he doesn’t, it’s going to end in tears, he can feel it.

 

“Are you going to be alright?” Natalie asks, and Tom sighs.

“Eventually,” he says, and he lets here give him a brief hug.

 

He never told Natalie that he loves Chris. She just saw it. The first time Chris called, Tom couldn’t help the broad grin that spread on his face, and by the time he remembered to hide the happy fluttering of his wings, Natalie had already understood what was going on. She promised him to keep his secret, though, and what choice did he have but to believe her?

Though now, he’s kind of glad she knows.

He’s never told anyone about his feeling for Chris, and if anybody has guessed now that they know he’s not entirely straight, nobody talked to him about it. It’s nice to have someone around who knows and genuinely cares, someone who really wants him to be happy.

 

“Come on,” he says. “It’s easier if we start from the roof.”

 

**{ooo}**

“I thought Tom was supposed to come in at the same time we did?” Mark asks, and Robert nearly snorts at Chris’ face when he is reminded his friend is late.

 

How does Elsa not feel bothered by that, he doesn’t know. If Susan were to be  _that_  intense about one her friend, male or female, he doesn’t think he’d be able not to feel at least envious, if not full-on jealous and possessive. Yes, he is well aware of the saying that advises to let people you love go, but that doesn’t mean he has to like the idea, and he’s only a fella, after all. He can’t be perfect.

Right now though, it’s mostly Chris that worries him –he’s been moody and withdrawn for a while now. In fact, he’s been in a bad mood from the moment Tom landed off that stupid tower with a wing bent out of shape and refused to let Chris help him to the ambulance. Robert thinks it’s probably something Tom needs to deal with on his own. He has, after all, been outed twice in as many years and that can’t be easy.

Sometimes, people need to deal with things on their own for a while, and Robert understands that… it doesn’t mean it’s easy to have to wait on the sidelines.

 

But hey, here they are, in Cannes, for marketing purposes more than anything else, but still. It’s a pretty nice place to be, and a good time of the year to be there, too, so Robert wants the kids to enjoy themselves.

(Susan snorted the first time he called them the kids, but he doesn’t mind being ridiculous about that.)

 

“Come on,” he tells Chris, pulling at his shoulder. “He’ll come. Maybe he just needs to take a breath before he—well, that’s what I call an entrance.”

 

Under his hand, Robert can feel Chris turn on his heels so fast he almost stumbles, and honestly he can’t blame him.

People in the audience are starting to notice what they’re looking at, and soon a forest of fingers points at the sky, yells and gasps filling the air as the press hastily readjusts its cameras to capture what is happening opposite the red carpet.

 

They are both dressed in white, Tom in a light, tieless costume, and Natalie in a flowing white dress that looks like it was made with milk rather than fabric. They glide over the seafront and take a sharp turn to the left when they reach the actual entrance to the palace; the sun shining behind them makes them look like angels descending from the sky, and something tells Robert he’s not about to forget that image anytime soon.

For a second, Robert fears they’re going to crash and his hand clenches around Chris’ shoulder. Beside him, Susan is gripping the waist of his costume. All of a sudden, both Tom and Natalie straighten up, bodies going vertical as their wings beat backward on the same ample rhythm, ruffling Susan’s hair and sending glitter against Robert’s sunglasses.

They both have to run a few steps to lose their momentums, but it’s obviously a well practiced gesture, probably something they rehearsed a lot, or Natalie would probably have stumbled over her dress. They stand there with their wings out for all the world to see, a statement as well as an event, and Robert feels proud of them for it, hopes they see the encouraging smile he sends their way.

 

“Wait,” he says when Chris tries to step forward, after the photographs have calmed down, “They’ll come to you inside but not now.”

“I just want to congratulate them,” Chris protests, but he already sounds defeated as he looks at the two winged actors.

“He’s right though,” Elsa says by his side. “It’s their moment.”

 

Natalie is hugging Tom like her life depends on it, and Robert is pretty sure he sees tears in both their eyes. Tom doesn’t look toward Chris once, and to say that’s not a relief would be a lie, too.

Behind them, the festival is entirely forgotten for at least the next ten minutes.

 

Robert agrees with Susan when she remarks it’s not necessarily a bad thing.


End file.
